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Topic: Greek pizza (Read 176027 times)

FWIW, I learned today from another General Mills employee that only the GM mills on the East Coast carry the Pillsbury label. The GM Superlative flour was recommended as an alternative for other parts of the country. The specs for the Superlative are the same as for the Full Strength.

On Tuesday, I conducted the following experiment as a comparison between Peters two new formulas above, and my "go to" formula (basically, the one in post #20 of this thread). I used GM Superlative flour and .8% CY in all three. All were baked in Normas' deck oven at market in my 10" "blackbuster" steel pans with a light coating of Pam olive oil spray. I kept the cheese to a minimum and no other toppings, besides sauce, were applied. First up was the "go to" pie. At 63% hy., this one seemed the most fermented of the three, and displayed a distinctive difference to the bottom of the pie. This was posibly the biggest difference between all the pies. The next pie included both egg and milk. This pie was a little overcooked IMO and hence, a little drier than the rest. To be honest, all three tasted about the same to me. Perhaps Norma will add her own perceptions of these pies. I'll likely conduct this experiment again at home in a more controlled environment, without the distractions of the market. I must say though, that I much prefer this style with the full compliment of toppings that I normally use.. ie much more cheese, including feta, spinach leaves and pepperoni and/or sausage These are the pies in order of baking.

I agree with you, that the 3 Greek pizzas you made did almost have the same tastes. As you posted, the Greek pie made with the milk and egg, really wasnít different. I also agree when being at market, it is harder to watch pies to know when they are finished, because there are distractions in waiting on customers and making other pies. I also thought the egg and milk Greek pizza was a little overbaked and wasnít as moist as the other two. All in all, they were great Greek pizzas in my opinion, but I also like the other toppings you normally use. I had taken home 3 slices to reheat but my daughter ate all three before I had a chance to taste them reheated.

My recollection is that the Greek style pizzas I had in Massachusetts had a more uniform bottom crust browning but the crumbs of your pizzas and the crust thicknesses look to be spot on.

Did you have any problems forming and handling the dough with the eggs and milk? As the egg/milk recipe I posted recently shows, the amounts of milk and eggs look large when used with 50 pounds of flour. But when scaled down to a single pizza size, their amounts are small. That is perhaps why you couldn't detect a great difference between the three pies. In this respect, you will note from Tom Lehmann's Q&A on eggs at http://www.pmq.com/mag/2004september_october/lehmann.php that he recommends using six large eggs, weighing about 13.5 ounces, for 40-50 pounds of flour. I used 16 ounces of eggs in the recipe I posted. I also seem to recall that one has to add about 5%--or possibly even more--whole eggs to detect their flavor in the finished crust. As Tom's Q&A also notes, the small amount of egg can get lost from a flavor standpoint because of the overpowering effects of other parts of the pizza. I think the cheese would be one such component.

Maybe in future visits to the pizza place that uses eggs and milk I will find out more about the amounts of eggs and milk.

Thanks for the PMQ link about the use of eggs. I found it informative and useful in how I may look at any further tests with eggs. I found all the doughs very easy to handle due mostly, I should think, to the relatively high percentage of yeast and the resultant degree of fermentation. As you may expect, the 63% hy. dough was the most extensible of the three. Further, that dough expanded about twice as much as the others, due in part, I'm sure, to the fact that these dough were stacked three deep in an igloo cooler with ice in the bottom, for about five hours at market, with the 63% dough being farthest from the ice. As for the not so even browning on the bottoms, these pizzas are hard to bake sometimes, because when they start to cook, steam builds up under the dough and lifts the pie from the pan, probably because the pie is sauced and cheesed to the side of the pan, creating a seal by which the steam cannot escape. I once had a pie get away from me to the point that it was shaped like a hemisphere in the pan when I finally checked on it! That pie, needless to say, was Not one of my better ones. That aside, of the three pies baked on Tuesday, I much preferred the bottom browning of the 63% dough. In the future, I may conduct more experiments using a greater % of both eggs and milk, adjusting the amount of water accordingly, of course.

Ever heard of cape cod cafe? The recipe I use taste almost identical. Dough recipe:

4 cups unbleached bread flour2/3 cup fine grind yellow cornmeal2 tablespoons sugar1ľ teaspoons table salt, or 2 Ĺ teaspoons kosher salt2 ľ teaspoons instant yeast5 Tablespoons corn oil1 cups water between 90į and 95įFĹ cup milkThe milk is an important part. Also, roll the dough VERY thin and when you place it on the pan (deep dish pan 1 to 2 inches) push the sides of the crust up on the pan. Make sure you spread the sauce to about the edge of the pan, and spread the cheese (use a mixture of mostly mozzarella and mild cheddar with parm. mixed in) to the edge, preferably putting some extra on the crust because cheddar cheese is what makes it that black color. Also make sure to oil the pan well. Cook at 450 for 10-15 minutes until it looks done to you. This is the sauce recipe I use

Also, make sure you just use a small amount of dough on each pizza because they should be 10 inches and need to be rolled thin. But being from Mass myself, once I moved I couldn't live with out bar-room style pizza. I went back to visit about a month ago and went to lynwood and cape cod cafe (first time and 5 years) and realized I HAD to learn the recipe because I couldn't live without it. Trust me, this recipe is almost dead-on.

I wanted to test my blackbuster steel pan I recently purchased at Bova Foods for a Greek Pizza. I know my regular Preferment Lehmann dough ball weight didnít give the desired TF for this attempt, but the pizza was good. At least I now know blackbuster steel pans do work better for a Greek Style pizza. I also didnít apply enough cheddar cheese with mozzarella for this pizza, because I was selling the slices at market. If I try this at home, I would add more white cheddar. Even though the preferment Lehmann dough was rolled out with a rolling pin, pressed into the pan and docked heavily, it still want to rise on the sides of the pan.

Nick, I made 2 pies last night using your recipe for Cape Cod pizza, and I gotta tell you......the crust was PERFECT!!! Unfortunately, the sauce didn't come out the way I remember it at "the Cod".I used Pastene crushed tomatoes, and followed your recipe to the letter, but for some reason it seems to be missing a flavor I just can't put my finger on.Has anyone been able to duplicate the sauce flavor used around the South Shore of MA?

It's an Earth food. They are called Swedish meatballs. It's a strange thing, but every sentient race has its own version of these Swedish meatballs! I suspect it's one of those great universal mysteries which will either never be explained, or which would drive you mad if you ever learned the truth.

Thanks, Norma, for the reply, and if the crust hadn't come out PERFECT, I'd try it your way but......The crust in the recipe Nick gave us is right on the money. I, too, used corn oil and cooked at 500 degrees, and the crust browned beautifully. It had just the right crisp, color and texture I was looking for.What I can't seem to perfect is the sauce recipe. I tried adding and subtracting the quantity of different ingredients and even added a couple of my own ingredients to try to tweak Nick's recipe, but it still isn't what I want.Anyone else got a recipe they want to share??And, by the way.......Trinity.......It's GREEK STYLE (bar room) pizza not GREEK PIZZA.

Anyone else got a recipe they want to share??And, by the way.......Trinity.......It's GREEK STYLE (bar room) pizza not GREEK PIZZA.

shboom,

I donít know how you how your tomato sauce to taste, but if you want to make your own tomato sauce, Lesís sauce, with fresh tomatoes is really good, in my opinion. These are some of different times I made Lesís sauce. http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,11539.0.html I did use Lesís sauce on the last Greek pictures I posted.

If you want to try the kind of tomato sauce I use at market, I can provide that link. I use Saporito Super Heavy sauce which is a Stanislaus brand of tomato products, and add other ingredients. I also like Escalon's 6in1 multi-purpose tomato product, with other spices added. I think Steve (Ev) uses Escalon 6in1, with microwaved ingredients on most of his Greek pizzas. Steve uses November's method of making his sauce. i can provide the link to November's method, if you want to see that.

Each members opinion is usually different, on the kind of tomato sauce they like, or what kind of ingredients they like added to their sauce.

I wanted to try out Peterís formula for MA#2 because I wanted to see how a Greek pizza would turn out, with such a low hydrations of 50.7%. I mixed the dough yesterday morning in my kitchen aid mixer for my 12Ē round steel pan, and used the rest of the numbers Peter set-forth for his MA# 2 formula.

I had my 12Ē steel pan at home, because I thought I was going to try out another cracker style dough last week, but never had time to get around to another cracker-style pizza. I forgot to take my 12Ē steel pan along to market today, so I had to substitute and use my other 12Ē round pan, that wasnít steel. I wasnít happy I forgot my steel pan, but thought I already had the dough made for market today, and had the dough at market since yesterday. I used Superlative flour as the flour for this pizza. I also used corn oil to oil the pan.

The dough did feel much drier than other Greek pizzas I have made. I also proofed the dough in the pan for about an hour. The Greek pizza skin was first dressed with garlic herb infused olive oil, sauce, hot Italian sausage sliced (I had bought at market and baked in the deck oven), spinach, sliced San Marzano tomatoes from my garden, kalamata dark olives, cheddar cheese, Feta, mozzarella, and a blend of three other cheeses.

The Greek pie turned out better than I thought it would. The edges were nice and crunchy, and Steve and I both though the pie was very tasty.